NASA -
Garver Honors Four for Saving the Life of a Fifth at NASA Langley

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Garver gave Exceptional Bravery Medals to Jeff Stewart and Perry Wagner of
Goddard Space Flight Center, Chip McCann of Johnson Space Center and Mike
Kirsch, a Langley engineer and lead of the Composite Crew Module team.

She reminded everyone that NASA's products were produced by NASA's people.

"I am just so thrilled that you all were there," she told the foursome
getting the awards.

"There" was a November 4 meeting in Langley's Building 1256, where the team
was getting ready for a module test.

"We were sort of sitting back, looking at data, and suddenly he had his head
back and it sounded like he was snoring," Wagner remembered of Roberts. "We
were sort of kidding him that it looked like the meeting was boring him, but
he didn't respond."

Stewart shook Roberts, and finding no response, laid him on the floor.

Wagner, McCann and Stewart immediately began administering CPR, as best they
could remember how.

"I think I'd had the training most recently," McCann said, "and that was
about six years ago."

Said Wagner: "I remember, like all of us, that we breathed on a mannequin in
grade school. That was the last time."

Stewart was more specific. "About 34 years ago, when I was in the Boy
Scouts."

But each took a role: Stewart working on Roberts' chest, Wagner doing
mouth-to-mouth resuscitation when Roberts began to turn blue and McCann
monitoring Roberts for a pulse rate.

"As soon as we put him down and tried to find a pulse on his wrist -- and
actually I thought I felt a faint pulse there -- Jeff put his hand on Paul's
chest and said 'I don't feel his heart beating here,' " McCann said. "By
then, I didn't feel anything on his wrist, and that was the time Jeff
started doing the compression."

The years since CPR training fostered uncertainty.

"It was a struggle for all of us," said McCann. "None of us were too sure
what we were supposed to be doing. We were trying to do the basics."

Kirsch was organizing everyone else, creating an impromptu emergency center,
calling 911, getting furniture out of the way for the arrival of paramedics
and trying to reach NESC Director Ralph Roe by Instant Messenger to find the
number of Roberts' wife, Ellen.

Stewart remembered an e-mail from his father-in-law a week earlier advising
that the old "five compressions" method of CPR had been superseded by a
recommended "30 compressions."

Wagner asked Stewart whether mouth-to-mouth was required, and finally
Stewart said OK. "It's better to do it than not to do it," Wagner said. "I
think I remember his color getting better."

Said Stewart: "Two to three minutes after we started to work on him, it
looked like he was trying to come around. It kind of gave us impetus to keep
going. It was, 'Wow, he's trying. We've got to keep going.'

"I had been taught that you had to press hard, almost to break his ribs, but
I didn't want to break his ribs. That was why our communication was so
important. As long as I got feedback from Chip that we were giving enough
blood to him, I could keep going the way we were."

Within 7-10 minutes, Emergency Medical Treatment personnel came in to take
over.

First, they told Stewart to continue chest compression. "But they told him
to do it faster and harder," McCann said. "The first thing they said was
'Are you tired? Can you keep going?' "

Then the paramedics used a defibrillator to shock Roberts' heart.

"By the way, that wasn't much fun," said Roberts, laughing on Wednesday.

But one shock brought him back.

"Then Paul started talking," Stewart said. "He said 'Why am I on the floor?
What happened?' "

Stewart filled him in on the ambulance ride to a local hospital, where a
pacemaker was installed. The verdict was that Roberts had not had a heart
attack, but that his electrical system had shut down. Also that without the
CPR by his co-workers, Roberts probably would have died.

"Let me give you an idea of how important what these guys did was," Roberts
said. "When I was in the hospital, I looked up some statistics on the
Internet. When you go into sudden cardiac arrest and you have somebody in
the room who sees you go down, the percentages are about 4-7 percent that
you survive.

"About 30 percent of that 4-7 percent have almost no mental degradation. I
think I'm in that 30 percent."